County officials are asking for artists to submit pieces reflecting the county’s heritage for the 2013 Columbus Day Juried Art Competition.

“We wanted a high-end art show, especially to highlight Columbia County,” Virginia Atkins, a county Community Events specialist. “We’re excited. It gives us an opportunity to look at Columbia County heritage and to celebrate current artists, local and regional.”

The art show will be held on Oct. 19 in conjunction with the sixth annual Columbus Day Festival and Art Show.

Four people qualified to seek a Harlem City Council position in the November nonpartisan election. Seats occupied by Councilmen John Thigpen and Rudolph Dixon are up for re-election on the Nov. 5 ballot.

Thigpen, 53, a chemical senior engineer at DSM Chemical in Augusta, has served on the council since 2003 and qualified to see his fourth term on the council. Dixon, 88, a retired Methodist minister, qualified to run for his seventh since his service began after his 1994 retirement.

Greenbrier Middle School sixth-graders Connor Sartain and Zachary Lyons huddled over Lyons’ Kindle looking up definitions and origins of words during a vocabulary lesson.

Such a sight could be the new look of education in Columbia County.

As part of the Bring Your Own Technology program, students are allowed to use cell phones and other wireless devices in classrooms to enhance learning. Columbia County School System officials are just beginning to implement the program that allows children to have a world of information at their fingertips.

Three people qualified this week to seek a seat on the Grovetown City Council in the November nonpartisan election.

Seats occupied by Lee Briggs and Bruce Stoddard are up for re-election on the Nov. 5 ballot.

Briggs, 39, is a John Deere operations manager. He was appointed Aug. 12 to fill the more than four months remaining of former Councilman Sonny McDowell’s term. He resigned in April after being convicted of federal bribery charges.

Stoddard, who has served 12 years on the council, is no seeking re-election.

A Columbia County grand jury indicted the former treasurer of an Evans neighborhood association on felony theft charges after she was accused in May of stealing more than a quarter-million dollars from the organization.